Setting Straight
by precious-passenger
Summary: Prompt for 'Kurt Angst Prompt of the Day'. Kurt finds out his mother was homophobic.


A/N: This was a prompt for 'Kurt Angst Prompt of the Day', because I was feeling like angst and torturing Kurt seemed to be the best cure. Enjoy.

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Kurt had been visiting the attic more often than usual after his dad's heart attack. The possibility of losing the only parent he had made him long for the one that wasn't there. Also, he'd spied on Burt practicing proposal speeches and knew that his moments with his dad were starting to be spent more with Carole. Simply he missed his mom so much.

He'd opened the scrapbook and turned the pages, from his first dance recital to the day he was born. As he went back, the pictures were getting older. He stopped as he reached a page, holding it closer in his lap.

It showed his mom and along with a group of her friends attending some sort of rally. He liked that photo so much because his mom was laughing as she held a poster, the photo capturing her face so well. Now she was forever laughing in that photo. She seemed so happy. Kurt wished he'd appreciated it more when he was a kid.

He stroked her face with his finger a little too roughly, thanks to the tears that seemed to be ever present in his face nowadays. The movement caused the photo to spiral to the floor, landing beside the remains of the bottle of perfume.

What captured Kurt's attention, what he hadn't noticed after all these years, was the small note in his mother's handwriting.

_Straight pride_ _1987_, the back of the photo said.

At first it was denial, _this is not what I think it is._ Then a gut wrenching sense of loneliness and ache filled him, making it hard to breathe. He took two steps at a time, reaching his room and closing the door forcefully before collapsing on his bed.

Typing _that _into his search engine took all the energy he had and the results that came up silenced that voice inside wishing it wasn't what he thought it was.

Dozens of photos of different rallies came in the images. Articles stating dates and places and the history of this movement. The logo, the one that now Kurt realized was the one his mom carried, was of a man and a woman holding hands.

He felt a stabbing pain in his chest and he held the throbbing spot tighter. He let the photo that caused all of this heartache fall beside him on the bed.

"Kurt, son. Are you…what's wrong?"

Before he knows it Burt was holding him tightly to his chest. He felt so vulnerable and tried to scramble out of the grip his dad had on him. He can't let anyone touching him after knowing the fact that his mom wouldn't accept him had she been alive. That he couldn't ever change her mind and lost the opportunity of making her happy with who he was.

"Mom doesn't love me," he sobs.

"What? Come on, son. What are you talking about?" Burt is puzzled and frankly, quite worried.

How can his dad expect him to pick himself up after this blow? The one brick he'd based his whole foundation on had shattered. He silently held the photo to his dad before bursting to a fresh round of tears again.

Burt finally separates him of his bone crushing hug, looking ashamed. But, to Kurt, it looks like he's ashamed of him, of who he'd become.

It wasn't his fault, was it? He'd tried being straight and failed miserably. He couldn't do that one thing right.

A sudden realization dawned on him and he whispered brokenly.

"You were there too, weren't you?"

When Burt nods, Kurt recoils, moving away and hugging his knees to his chest. He'd never felt so alone in his life and starts sobbing in earnest.

"I told you there are some moments in my past that I'm not that proud of, kiddo," Burt starts, looking down, "but, when I held you in my arms, I knew I would love you no matter what. Your mother did too. We were so happy to have that little beautiful kid in our lives."

Kurt shook his head, no longer believing. It didn't make him love his mother less, but to know that she might've thought the opposite wrecked him. Being gay wasn't the only part of him but he wondered if his mother would've thought the same.

"Your mother _loved_ you. She joined you in your tea parties. Let you put makeup on her and order her what to dress in parties. She wiped your tears when a group of boys threw you in the pond because you designed your own shirt and had glitter on it. She raised hell in school for that," Burt said, letting his own tears fall.

"I am so so sorry, Kurt," he said, voice rough from holding in the tears, "we had been so ignorant but you've shown us, even when you were just a little kid, you taught us how to love in a way that we didn't think was possible."

"I forgive you," Kurt says, because how could he not?

"I'm proud of you, son," he says, squeezing his leg.

"Me too, dad. Me too," is what Kurt says before throwing himself like a little kid to his father's lap.

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A/N: It's really important for me to know what you thought of this one shot. Please let me know.


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